General Reports

[White Whale]

Are 17th and 18th of Jyly National holidays? Are bars closed? Other noteworthy dates near future?

[Evil Penivel]

I tought this could be of interest to members here in the Forum:

The story about police hunting down Internet posters has been debunked on the Pattaya boards. It was an attempt (quite successful, actually) to attract attention to a blog that otherwise had about five readers. But in the end, the only result has been to make the guy behind the blog an object of derision. The blog's author has been forced to significantly revise his original article because he got it so wrong.

To be sure, you can get into a lot of trouble for taking dirty pics in Thailand and even the mild topless stuff counts as pornography. If the police happen to discover locally made pornography featuring Thai girls on your computer/camera/DVDs/whatever, you can be in for a hell of a hassle. That's a very good reason for not taking nude pics, much less hard-core stuff.

However, it's not true that the Thai police are using Internet boards to "hunt down" amateur photographers. On occasion, the BIB have gone after PROFESSIONAL pornographers who run pay sites, but there is no indication they have gone looking for girls whose pictures appeared on Internet boards in order to squeeze amateur photographers.

Evil

[Member #3428]

Only in thailand would the DVD sales lady at Pantip find out your B day and give you a present of a tin of cookies... (yes micklicker, the old crow got me a present if you can believe it ) amazing thailand at times...

From wanting to strangle the thai girls to thinking how sweet and amazing they can be. Thai women truely have a beauty side and an ugly side to them.. or atleast the ones I end up dating...

[Blunderer]

Tor won't help you here.

What Tor will help you with is the following:

Hiding your IP address from the site's administrator.
Hiding what you are browsing to from the internet provider (ie, hotel, ISP, Chinese government etc)

Thats scary news..

Use Tor


torproject.org

In hell they wont be able to catch anything we do if we are using TOR

[PinkPearl]

Quality of life and degree of basic satisfaction (i.e happiness) with ones lot are a lot more relevant than the degree of luxury of ones surroundings or size of ones monthly pay check. I have met guys on big money who are as miserable as sin and guys who don't 'have a pot to [CodeWord140] in' but are happy and content with their lot.

Must admit that the degree of arrogance and smug self satisfaction displayed by some members of this forum fair take the breath away! GH

Well said! Truth. Word!

Those here who have to boast about their income are miserable.

Like Howard Hughes.

For example, one cannot decide if LOS makes him more happy or sad.

E.G. , one day they feel they want go to Burma, the next home to Canada, but thereafter they want to stay in LOS! LOL

[PinkPearl]

Well, most Farangs I know make above 100k thb / month

I wouldn't go that far but 35k/month certainly is very little.... it wouldn't even cover my rent (without utilities)

100G THB. Wow. Evidently your circle is very small, in a number of ways.

So you can blow over 35K/mo on rent, more than Opebo & most farangs teaching English make overall. I am so impressed!

I wonder if you think your business is providing such a benefit to society.

So you might be able to live a little bit more comfortably, have a few more or better toys {e. G. Mercedes instead of Honda}, be able to waste dollars on expensive restaurants, etc. So what?

Or in OTH's case, saving for a retirement that may never cum. Or if it does, since he is already well into his 50's, not be able to enjoy it. Is that not a dangerous gamble, or what?

BTW my income, after taxes, is over 30 million BAHT, and that is without doing any work. Whenever I decide to employ myself it adds to that total.

Cheers, mates!

LOL!

[Starchild2012]

Thats scary news..

Use Tor


torproject.org

In hell they wont be able to catch anything we do if we are using TOR

[Dinghy]

This story reminds of WHY they make "whole disk encryption" programs. The computer won't even BOOT without the PASSWORD. Nothing goes IN and NOTHING comes OUT without BOOTING

[Happy Fucker]

I tought this could be of interest to members here in the Forum:

http://www.pattayaghost.com/2008/06/...-porn-posters/

"If you thought your password made it safe for you to post nude photos of your Thai teerak on a Pattaya Internet message board, think again. Pattaya police not only have “Level 2″ access, but some enterprising officers are hunting down amateur pornographers and their models and demanding payoffs under threat of jail time.

“They’re going around all the bars looking for the girls and then getting the girls to tell them who shot the photos,” said New Living Dolls One owner Shane (aka “Alan Lad”). “Then they’re hitting the girls up for small amounts of money and the farangs for big money.”

Shane was summoned to his go-go one afternoon last week to meet with an officer well-known to Pattaya Waking Street bar owners. The officer came armed with color printouts of Internet message board pages featuring nude, hotel shots of a former NLD1 dancer and wanted copies of her ID card and her current address.

Shane said he refused to cough up the ID card copies and sent the officer on his way after telling him he didn’t know where the woman currently worked.

Shane said, however, his found his former dancer about two days later and learned the police had found her working for her current Soi Diamond employer. “Her face just fell when she saw me,” he said. The dancer said the officer had threatened to arrest her on pornography charges unless she paid a fine and told him who shot the photos, where and when.

Police have increasingly been monitoring all Thailand internet traffic since the passage of the new Computer Crime Act last year. Under the new law, police or government officials can seize computers from homes and offices without a warrant if the machines are suspected of containing pornographic material or evidence connected to criminal activities or cyber crimes.

The new law has already spawned widespread abuse, with owners of Internet cafes all over Thailand complaining that police are seizing computers after planting porn on the machines during “inspections” and then demanding large payoffs to get the computers back.

Message boards such as the Pattaya Secrets, Pattaya Adicts and some others do not allow nude photos to be posted on the “open” Level 1, which anyone can access with a simple e-mail address. Members are promoted by board administrators to higher levels where explicit photos can, and regularly are, uploaded.

However, “Level 2” only offers a false sense of security, as Secrets continually fights a tide of members showing Level 2 and even exclusive “Level 3” posts to non-members, other boards and even girls whose photos are taken without permission. Complaints lodged with police by the victims of such photos are suspected to be one reason why all the message boards are now under the police microscope.

The police officer’s printouts clearly showed police have gained access to a “Level 2″ somewhere, most likely by obtaining passwords from the increasing numbers of Pattaya ex-pats arrested on sexually-related crimes.

This month’s arrest of American Todd Arthur Williams on Internet pornography charges is just an example of how the police are working to stamp out Net porn. Williams has been identified as a member of Pattaya Secrets, Teak Door, Pattaya Addicts and probably other Pattaya and Thai boards. According to the more than four dozen comments posted here on The Pattaya Ghost’s article on Willaims’ arrest, Williams is now thought to be cooperating with police, providing names of other Net pornographers and passwords to various free and for-pay online forums.

Tourists are obviously less at risk of police persecution than locals, provided they post their sexy photos after they’ve left the country. Yet if police track down the hotel at which the photos were taken, they can obtain copies of passports and passport numbers, making it possible the tourist might be blacklisted or arrested upon return to Thailand.

For ex-pats the risks are even higher. Guys who delight in showing off their latest conquest now run a real risk of getting an unwelcome knock on the door."

Happy Hunting,

HF

[Cheap Meat]

With a good credit score and an average household income you'd be amazed at how much unsecured loans the banks will give you. If you aren't planning to return home, you could always build up your credit lines and max them out. I've heard of people with average incomes getting up to $250k in credit cards. At 5% interest, you'd be making 33k baht a month for the rest of your life without lifting a finger!

[Cunning Stunt]

Quality of Life is also an issue. Some have a better quality of life living in Asia or such even if they do not have a high standard of living. I know I would go nuts living in America again.

Got it in one. Quality of life and degree of basic satisfaction (i.e happiness) with ones lot are a lot more relevant than the degree of luxury of ones surroundings or size of ones monthly pay check. I have met guys on big money who are as miserable as sin and guys who don't 'have a pot to [CodeWord140] in' but are happy and content with their lot.

Must admit that the degree of arrogance and smug self satisfaction displayed by some members of this forum fair take the breath away! GH

[Dinghy]

"go nuts" maybe, but "go broke" if NOT.

as a German saying goes "Schaffen, schaffen Hausle bauen"

("work hard and make your own little place" - more or less) No work, no money - no money, no honey.

It's why I keep coming back to both places

[Member #3428]

So the other reason besides sex that guys teach here is that though the job is horrible, the standard of living is much higher than they would have back home.

Quality of Life is also an issue. Some have a better quality of life living in Asia or such even if they do not have a high standard of living. I know I would go nuts living in America again.

[Opebo]

One wonders what motivates a 40-something man (99% are men, afterall) to come here and work for such a paltry sum. A criminal record, perhaps?

No, Thai women, in some cases prostitutes, in some cases 'not', motivate them, obviously.

Admittedly 35,000/month provides an ok lifestyle upcountry. But, you still can't save anything and can't go anywhere. So what happens? These guys fritter away their lives, and suddenly find themselves in their 50s and 60s without a pot to [CodeWord140] in or a wall to throw it over. I've seen it happen all too often here.

The thing is they wouldn't have a pot to [CodeWord140] in back home anyway. Lots of people have very low incomes, particularly in the US. Back there I doubt I could make more than double the $1,200/month I make here, and the cost of living is four times as much. So the other reason besides sex that guys teach here is that though the job is horrible, the standard of living is much higher than they would have back home.

[Old Thai Hand]

Not at all. Virtually every farang teacher I have met up country is over 30, with the great majority being much older than me (that is, over 40). And they all make 30-35k, and are of course greatly envied and resented by the Thais for the huge salary.

Unless they have money stashed away or are retired and on a pension and are merely teaching for something to do (and to get a work permit and visa, perhaps), these individuals are just underachieving wasters, IMO.

One wonders what motivates a 40-something man (99% are men, afterall) to come here and work for such a paltry sum. A criminal record, perhaps?

Admittedly 35,000/month provides an ok lifestyle upcountry. But, you still can't save anything and can't go anywhere. So what happens? These guys fritter away their lives, and suddenly find themselves in their 50s and 60s without a pot to [CodeWord140] in or a wall to throw it over. I've seen it happen all too often here.

I repeat. At that age, unless one's making at least 100k/month here, one should be doing something better with one's life.